Year of the Tiger: Lunar New Year, Full Sheet of 20 x 32-Cent Postage Stamps, USA 1998, Scott 3179

The U.S. Postal Service celebrated the Year of the Tiger with the issuance of a 32-cent stamp on January 5, 1998 at the Asian Art Museum in Seattle, Washington. Artist, Clarence Lee of Honolulu, HI, created a distinctively modern and Chinese design with a paper-cut two dimensional look. A professional calligrapher, Lau Bun, wrote Kanji characters to state the name of each stamp on the left side. Kanji is a Japanese adaptation to Chinese characters and can be read by a variety of Asian groups from differing countries and cultures. The tiger is the 3rd of the 12 animals in the Chinese zodiac associated with the Lunar calendar. People of Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, Tibetan, and Mongolian heritage celebrate the Lunar New Year.